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What's in a name?
A list of companies and places with interesting name origins.
Companies
- Adidas is a portmanteau of its founder’s name, Adi Dassler.
- Akamai is a Hawaiian word meaning “intelligent” or “clever.”
- Coca Cola’s name refers to it’s original ingredients, kola nuts (a source of caffeine) and coca leaves.
- LEGO’s name is derived from the Danish phrase, “leg godt,” which means “play well.”
- Mozilla is a portmanteau of “Mosaic” and “killer” (Mosaic referring to the Mosaic web browser).
- Mt. Gox the now-defunct BitCoin exchange, was named as such because its founder had reused the domain name mtgox.com. He’d originally purchased this domain to build a website for Magic: The Gathering cards. This name is an abbreviation for “Magic: The Gathering Online eXchange.”
- Pepsi was originally introduced in 1893 as “Brad’s Drink.” It was later renamed Pepsi Cola in 1898 after the Greek root word, “pepsin,” which refers to digestion.
- Venmo is a portmanteau of “vendor” and “mobile.”
- Work is a portmanteau of “video” and “evolution.”
- Verizon is a portmanteau of “veritas” (Latin for “truth”) and “horizon.”
- Volkswagen is German for, “people’s car.”
Places
- Armageddon is an actual place, about an hour’s drive from Tel Aviv, Israel. The word comes from the Hebrew “Har Megiddo,” meaning “Mount of Megiddo”.
- Las Vegas means “the meadows” in Spanish.
- Los Angeles means “the angels” in Spanish.